A Grievous Fault
by Calais Brooke
Summary: Discontent simmers in the industrial sprawl of District 8. Yet navigating the bitter streets of home is only half of the battle for 15 year old Autumn Landry, whose hopes of love and life collide with a darker destiny. As the 69th Hunger Games loom, Autumn faces the dire reality of a nation divided - and a growing shadow that threatens to black out her future.
1. Fracture of the Mind

It's midnight, which means one thing: I'm wide awake. Whether that's because of insomnia or memories of impaled teenagers, I don't know.

Fifteen years haven't been kind to these Capitol trains. Rust scabs over the once-sparkling chrome of the bathroom faucets. A thick woven brown blanket has replaced the luxurious silks that lay on these beds before, the old feeling of lying on a cloud as the motherly rocking of the train lulled me to sleep deemed wasteful and thrown aside for the economical utility of a shaggy yak to keep me warm at night. Smudges of olive grease speckle the housefly-buzzing lights in the ceiling, and grimy whorls of forgotten fingerprints dot the steel walls. I don't think President Snow would have approved of the décor.

Still, skipping off to the Capitol for an "administrative trip" beats shipping off to a fight to the death with twenty-three other kids. Things have changed more than a bit in this country.

I scatter loose leaves of paper across the shaggy yak. They're the ink-blotted monuments to my muddled memories, chapters of a mission to dig up the past that Plutarch Heavensbee says will be good for me. Somewhat incorrect: "It will be good for posterity, and for you, Autumn," says Plutarch, who resembles less Heaven's bee and more a pinstriped suit-wearing, cliché-spewing bumblebee in his advanced age. It's perplexing what wins presidential elections in post-war Panem.

Something _thud_s out in the hall just as the train hits a bump. I start and grab the first piece of paper my hand clutches, as if I can kill some dangerous intruder by reading to it. It'd be a new strategy, for sure.

"Yeah?" I call out, hoping for the _thud_ding thing in the hall to reply.

I can tell myself a million times that there's nothing on this train, but it won't settle me down until I see it with my eyes. Maybe it's just one of the workers stubbing his toes for fun in the dead of night. Maybe it's some Vile Wriggling Thing coming to force my door open and convulse on the floor to make doubly sure I don't get any sleep tonight. Maybe it's just my memories creeping up on my ears with the sounds of lingering ghosts.

I have enough of those to last the night already.

* * *

Cecelia Sanchez was a frequent customer in my father's grocery store, but I'd never come face-to-face with the winner of the 59th Hunger Games while shopping for all of District 8's treasured confections, from salt pork to salted carrots to canned preservatives of gooey mash. In fact, I met Cecelia in the last place anyone wants to meet a strong former Victor: In a grimy back alley in the middle of the night.

I should have left Hector's house earlier in the day, but instead I dawdled there after my four-hour shift at the pants factory had ended (that in addition to eight hours of school before. Nothing toughens up a kid like choking on smog. Good for the lungs!) I'd met Hector, one of my closest friends in District 8 and the son of the secretary to old Mayor Shay, while mastering the technique of sewing pockets onto the butt linings of trousers. Work made strange bedfellows, but I didn't shy away from his company. It was nice to have friends in this city, a cold industrial maze in more ways than one.

"Why don't you just stay here for the night, Autumn?" Hector had said that chilly evening as flurries had fluttered from the sky. A smattering of snow caked the high black rooftops of the town square, and frost yet to be smeared with smog and dirt clung to the red brick walls of the buildings and the gray cobblestone of the street.

I shook my head and pointed over my shoulder. "Dad gets pissed off whenever I don't tell him what I'm doing," I said. "Just say hi at school."

Hector slumped his shoulders and waved goodbye with a limp hand. He was a year older than me, but the chilly air and the harsh glow of the golden street lamps made his face look jagged and mature. Maybe it was his high cheekbones and black eyes that complemented the urban noir of the night, but my friend seemed ready to wrestle his way free from childhood and into adulthood.

I'd seen my friend Ithaca, also fourteen, already begin to change from growing up, eying boys and speaking in eager whispers. It hadn't hurt our friendship, but given some of the things I'd heard Ithaca mention about boys, I hoped Hector didn't change _too_ much. At least, I hoped he didn't get weird.

But I wouldn't watch him transform into some grunting gargoyle on that night. I scurried away from his steps, clutching my red sweater around my chest and inhaling daggers of icy air. _Yikes_, my lungs complained. _You need a sweater for us, too_.

I trooped down the lifeless midnight streets of the district, scuffling between the blank stares of many-eyed apartments that towered for a dozen stories on either side of the street. The temperature rose as I walked further from the business district and closer to the industrial heart of District 8, lost in my thoughts of creating a nose-sweater during a lull at work. Coughs of wispy steam choked up from grates in the cobblestone. Snow melted on the way down, dripping through the filter of smog as a greasy drizzle onto my brown hair.

The streets were a soggy mess, and the cramped confines of the alleys didn't make things any more pleasant. I don't know if many outsiders could avoid claustrophobia in District 8. Most of the streets were tight and narrow, tiny gaps between the stoic canyon walls of the six-story brick buildings on either side. They were hardly large enough for more than a few people to walk side-by-side in. I'd measured the street outside my father's grocery once when he wasn't paying attention: The cobblestone alley was approximately 32 potatoes from one soot-covered wall to the other. It was just wide enough to cram in the hordes of worker bees headed to and fro every day, but at night, the narrow street seemed lonely.

The sprinkle distracted me from my walk back to my dad's grocery in the center of the industrial ward, and I took a wrong turn down a side alley. I regretted this hazy stroll as soon as I came face-to-face with my greatest enemy.

A Vile Wriggling Thing of mammoth proportions slithered down an off-gray dumpster situated just to the right of a steamy vent. I suppose it was some sort of giant white worm enjoying a midnight waltz in the closest hot spot it could find, but any Vile Wriggling Thing of sufficient size, regardless of composition or name or color, is as horrifying as the next. Being thirteen and alone under the flickering lights of District 8's streets didn't bother me much, but this glistening, squirming monstrosity of hellish make pricked every fear indicator in my primordial brain.

"_Gwuh!_" I screamed, twisting on the spot and flapping my arms as if I'd take off and fly.

Perhaps I did take off right then and there and escape the lurching beast, as my futile avian attempts led me to running at breakneck speed down the next alley. By the time I opened my eyes and convinced myself that I had left the Vile Wriggling Thing shaking its fist in defeat and cursing my flight, I smacked right into a pair of grunting gargoyles.

"The fuck?" said gargoyle number one, a tall gorilla with floppy blonde hair.

I stumbled back. More and more it looked like a stupid idea not to stay at Hector's.

"Hi," I squeaked. "Going. Going home."

Gargoyle number two grabbed the hem of my sweater with his ursine mitt. "My home, yeah?" he said. "Been a fuckin' while."

"Can't," I stuttered, my breath catching in my throat. "No."

I realized I was in trouble. These two boys – in retrospect, I'm not sure they were of genus _Homo_ – weren't nice strangers happy to take me back to my home above the grocery. I couldn't see Hem Grabber's face in the shadows, but I imagined he wasn't so interested in helping me.

"C'mon," Hem Grabber said, yanking me towards him. "Pretty little blue eyes. I like that. Give you a nice lil' treat if you give me one."

This was going nowhere good. I whimpered and wrenched free of Hem Grabber's grip, bursting off down the cobblestone towards the street ahead. I didn't get more than three steps before Gorilla snagged the end of my ponytail and pulled hard. I shrieked and toppled over to the ground as he planted a foot on my back.

"Psh," Gorilla forced my face down into the muck. "You're gonna mess up your pretty sweater."

I squirmed and balled my hands into fists, but Gorilla had too strong of a grip. Prickly heat spiked across my skin. I closed my eyes tight, flailed with my hands, and gurgled out my last protest when something _oof_ed behind me.

"Hey, hey, the hell are you –" Gorilla started to say before I heard a loud _thwup_, followed by a shrill yelp.

I flipped over and huddled against the wall. Gorilla had beaten a hasty retreat, but someone tall and well-built stood over Hem Grabber with a brick in her hand. He – or she – smashed it into the boy's chin, eliciting another yelp from his mouth and a spray of blood onto the ground.

The stranger kicked Hem Grabber in the gut. "Go fuck yourself," said the newcomer in a surprisingly sweet voice.

Hem Grabber scrabbled over the cobblestone and scrambled away towards the darkness, leaving me and the stranger alone in the alley. I crab-walked away from her as fast as I could, unsure if she had showed up in time to help me – or take me for herself.

"You alright?" the woman said, leaning into the light.

Every muscle of mine tensed. All of District 8 recognized the soft, full-cheeked face that stared down at me. Cecelia's wavy brown hair and puddle eyes may have looked kind, but she had proven herself a vicious fighter. The red flush in her cheeks tonight and her stony expression told me that two alley goons wouldn't bother her.

I was done with this evening.

"Erk!" I gasped, jumping to my feet and clutching a hand around my waist. "Get away!"

"Wait! I'm not gonna hurt you. I'll take you home, okay?" Cecelia protested, frowning and holding out a hand. "Hang on. I've seen you before, you're –"

I shook my hand and backpedaled. No chance. I was done listening.

Cecelia said something indecipherable as I spun and rushed away down the street. No victors. No fighting. Let me go home.

The streets blurred into a fog of cobblestone and industrial grime as I sprinted down the alleys, clutching one arm around my waist and pumping the other as fast as it could go. For the first time, these streets scared me. This smoggy, industrial labyrinth hid much more danger than just something slimy oozing on a dumpster. There were real monsters in the dark, too, and some of them looked just like anyone else.

By the time I plowed into the thin tin front door of my father's grocery, my lungs heaved, my stomach roiled, and my swamped eyes dribbled rivers down my chalky cheeks.

My father, predictably, asked why the hell I'd been out so late.

* * *

Cecelia never returned to my father's grocery after that, and I never saw her on the street again for quite some time. I don't know if she'd felt anxious about my reaction or whether she simply found a better grocer and forgotten all about me, but I didn't forget her – or that night.

Something fragile had snapped in my mind when my face had hit the slushy walk.

I didn't see Cecelia at the next year's Reaping, either, when I dutifully wrote my name in meek little letters on three slips of paper and exhaled in relief when some eighteen year-old girl I sure didn't know headed off for the Capitol. It took a full year and a half since that night, on a stormy summer day long after some boy from District 10 had won the 68th Games and I'd begun to stop looking over my shoulder every ten feet, before I'd see Cecelia again.

If only we could've met in better circumstances.

* * *

**Author's Note: Thanks for reading! This is my story of the lead-up to the events of the **_**Hunger Games**_** trilogy, along with a deeper dive into the Capitol and the stirrings of insurrection glossed over in the books. I always love to hear feedback, constructive criticism and pointers, and any other questions/comments, so feel free to leave a note! Violence, mature content, graphic imagery, and suggestive themes to follow, so rated T. All content of the **_**Hunger Games**_** saga is the exclusive property of Suzanne Collins. **


	2. Bleak Streets

_Thap-thap-thap-thap-thap!_

The needle-tapping drone of my sewing machine had long since turned into a haze. Combined with the fog of a poor night's sleep, the drumming of the factory floor weighed down my insomnia-plagued eyelids. Only a minor miracle – and hours of repeating and memorizing the machine motion of sliding scarlet corduroy fabric under the jackhammering of the needle – spared me from slipping up and spearing my finger.

I didn't sleep well anymore. A year and a half had passed since the two thugs had tried to…to hurt me in the sloppy alleyway that bitter winter night, but I now viewed District 8 with a suspicious eye. Grunts from outside my mousehole of a basement bedroom window signaled any number of terrors ready to drag me through the wall at night. A pounding rainstorm could camouflage lurking threats snaking up the streets. Spotting a worm or other sort of Vile Wriggling Thing I'd always feared was an omen of murderous danger waiting around the next corner. I kept my head on a swivel, and relaxing enough to fall asleep at a reasonable hour or enjoy a sun-soaked day took herculean effort.

"Autumn. You're drifting off again."

I blinked and shook my head. To my left, Hector crouched over his work table and slid another piece of fabric under his sewing machine while staring at me with a raised eyebrow. He'd gotten used to this new thing I was even though I'd never told him the details of that night.

"Entertain me," I yawned.

He ran a hand through his bushy red hair and sighed, "You want me to, like, dance or something? Dunno if they'd allow that."

I glanced down towards the end of the long factory floor. Fifty meters away, across from the whirring apparatus of cogs and gears and workers and needles, "they" reclined against the wall with their eyes half-shut. The two nameless Peacekeepers were there every day with their long rifles, one short and skinny and plagued with a face full of speckled acne, the other tall and stocky with a receding, graying hairline. Nothing exciting enough to warrant their watch ever happened. Hector's idea of an impromptu dance might even have brightened their days.

Across from me, my friend Ithaca (how did I make all of my friends from this monotonous factory anyway?) sniffed and picked a glossy purple thread from her silvery hair. "I heard something new the other day," she said. "S'prised you didn't hear it from your dad, Hector."

"Yeah, 'cuz telling me everything the mayor says is part of his job," Hector said with a roll of his eyes. "What's this amazing secret of yours?"

"'Bout tomorrow."

"Shit, is there someone new for the Reaping?"

"'Kay, not exactly tomorrow. But it's about the Games and all."

I yawned again. Ithaca leaned forward with a glare. "Can you pay attention Autumn? It's exciting."

"Yeah," I said. "Yeah, firing on all pistons here. Go for it."

Ithaca opened her mouth to speak when a booming "Son of a bitch!" from a table a dozen feet away stopped her. Appliances sure could be dangerous.

"About the Games," Ithaca said. "I was watching the Capitol TV stuff last night, since my mom's into that. They were mentioning since the Games last year were so boring –"

"Real hard to top everyone bashing each other's brains in with spiked maces" Hector scoffed.

"Yeah. So that old Head Gamesmaker, Minos or whatever his name is, said they're going to, 'Add a twist' this year."

"What's that mean?" I murmured.

"I dunno. More mutts? Nothing at the Cornucopia? No Cornucopia at all? At least it'll be fun. These last few have sucked."

"Few" was a polite way of putting the recent track record of the Hunger Games. I wasn't afraid of the Reaping: District 8 was a colossal city, behind only the very largest districts in Panem in population. The chances that Ithaca, Hector, or I were selected tomorrow were laughably remote, especially considering that none of us took tesserae. The Reaping was more just an hour-long time suck capped off by watching two spectacularly unlucky kids dragged off to oblivion.

As entertainment, however, the Games had failed at the highest order. The putrid miasma of cranial mash and starvation that had welled up from last year's mace-tastrophe of an arena had threatened to cost the Head Gamesmaker his job – if not worse. Some iron-faced, zero-personality boy from District 10 (Looking back now, he was a real jerk) had won in that snowy arena, but for the six (!) Games preceding it, the favorites had run away with the thing. Nothing had been worse than the 65th Games, when District 4's Finnick Odair had obliterated the competition with a sponsor-gifted trident and forced a rule change that limited individual contributions.

At least that had sparked controversy.

"We need to kill a half-hour 'til closing time," Ithaca said, glancing up at the man-sized clock on the wall that ticked with all the hurry of a tortoise at high noon on the riverbank. "Autumn, you're the baby of the three of us. If you get picked tomorrow, how're you gonna win?"

"I'm the baby?" I said, shoving another length of corduroy under my sewing machine's needle. "I'm a year younger than you. I'm not eight."

"Close enough."

"I'm not even going to get Reaped anyway."

"Don't poop on the pie. Just answer it."

I leaned back in my folding chair and crossed my arms. My butt tingled as it woke up from an hour of being jammed into the diamond-hard plastic of the seat. "I'd tell everyone to do their killing quietly so I could sleep."

"Classy way of doing it," Hector said.

"Yeah? Maybe I'll tell everyone classy poems until they die. What's your great idea to win?"

"Like he'd get picked," said Ithaca.

"He has one more slip than me," I countered. "So do you."

"He wouldn't get picked," she said again.

I glanced up just as Ithaca tossed a look Hector's way. He hadn't seen it, but something about the way her cheeks lost a shade of color struck me as odd. Why was she so concerned about his chances tomorrow when she'd been so quick to ask me how I'd fare in the arena? We three had always just been friends. That was that. A constant. A given.

This warranted observation.

The last half-hour passed at a glacial pace, serenaded by the _thap-thap-thap!_ of the sewing needles. Receding Hairline Peacekeeper picked his ear four times during those thirty minutes, and by the time the clanging bell sounded out to mark the end of our shift, I was thankful that I wouldn't have to count the minutes in here or in school again tomorrow. The Reaping gave everyone a day off – apart from the two unlucky kids and their families, of course.

Hector, Ithaca, and I picked our way through the crowd to escape the factory floor. A golden sunset tinted the street when we burst through the rusty iron doors of the plant. Thick smog billowed out from the adhesive plant across the town, polluting the bright sky with its charcoal cataract.

"Hector," Ithaca said as we were about to split. "You want to…uh, my family's not doing anything. You want to come over for a bit?"

He glanced at me for a moment before answering, "Yeah, that's cool. See you tomorrow, Autumn."

My stomach gurgled as Ithaca shot me a glance and the two of them vanished into the high tide of the crowd. It wasn't just that I had fears that Ithaca and Hector were growing closer than just _friends_, a situation that could leave me on the perilous outside looking in. Over the past year, I'd from time to time asked Hector to take me home whenever I'd felt unsettled about walking down the streets after work. Even though the summer sun was still up, I felt apprehensive.

I squeezed my eyes shut and shouldered my pack full of school notebooks and spare needles for work. All on me, then.

The crowd swarmed around me like a school of fish as I hurried down the cramped street. I pulled the straps of my pack tighter around my shoulders and looked down, a cell lost in this urban artery. _Leave me alone, leave me alone_, my mind cried as I bumped into strangers on either side of me. _Ugh_. My pulse quickened and I breathed faster. Someone behind me in the crowd coughed, and I snapped my head back over my right shoulder. No attackers. Just the crowd.

I was vulnerable here. No one would pay any attention of some antsy fifteen year-old girl stumbled off into the wrong street. No one would bat an eyelash if some predatory brute dragged her down a grimy alley. Everyone just wanted to get home.

_Stop it,_ I told myself as my heart accelerated to a breakneck pace. _Stop thinking about it_.

Naturally, that only made me think harder about what kind of dangerous things were waiting to grab me. _Damn it, the Hunger Games would be better than this_, I thought as I skirted past a pair of skinny old men in animated conversation. _At least I'd know for sure everyone was trying to kill me_.

A hand grazed my shoulder. I squeaked and jumped to the side as a man in a bright white vest pushed past me in the crowd and turned down another corner. _Another false alarm_.

I cursed my mind for its attentiveness, but I knew I couldn't ignore it. Suppose something else happened? Maybe I'd call it stupid just before something awful happened. I had to keep my eyes open in District 8. These streets had taught me that this wasn't a nice place. Maybe the Capitol was, given its portrayals of smiling, well-dressed people and their pink-dyed dogs on TV. Maybe District 1 and District 4 were, given their attractive tributes and hordes of sponsors. Maybe those places had it better, but not here. A girl like me could be forgotten and discarded easily in a place like this.

I dashed down the alley to my home before something could grab me, rushing past the door to my father's grocery as a customer walked out. I shoved open the door next to the storefront and launched myself into our guest room, slamming the door behind me and locking it shut.

"Autumn?"

I spun around. My mother stood with a bowl of water in her hands, caught in mid-stride headed towards the bathroom.

"Are you okay?" she asked.

The stress of living with my demanding father had taken the toll on her face. Squiggly lines ran from one side of her forehead to the other. Here and there, her brown hair sported a bastard strand of gray. Even her hands seemed on edge, shaking just a tad as they held the bowl. I felt stupid for startling her.

"I'm fine," I lied.

"Did something happen at school?"

"No."

"At work?"

"No."

I hurried past her before she could come up with more questions, rushing down the creaky wooden stairs and dashing off into my pint-sized bedroom. I shut the door behind me, tossing my pack to the ground and flopping onto the bed that was growing too small for me by the day. The air smelled stale down here, like the supply closets in the factory when no one had cleaned them for weeks and mildew had begun to crop up in the corners of the floor. Still, it was familiar, and the cool air helped calm me down.

Why couldn't I even talk to my own mother about my stupid thoughts? Why'd I have to rush home through the crowd like an idiot, glancing over my shoulder for some danger that never happened? I clenched my fist and pressed it against my forehead. Fuck this place. Fuck these streets, and those two monsters who had driven a wedge between my careful mind and my perceptions of District 8. I wanted to get away from here, but that was a stupid thought. No one got away from District 8 - no one except those doomed kids who died every year.

I wondered if Cecelia remembered me. Probably not. No one gave a damn about a random teenager's problems in District 8.

Doubtful anyone would remember the two poor sods who the Capitol Reaped tomorrow.


End file.
